Magical Urbanism, a website about urbanization, design and social change, is maintained by Mike Ernst. I'm an urban planner and designer based in New York City. I graduated from the Forget the Cloud: Anonymous File Sharing Takes to the Streets
Why store your data in the cloud when you can just store it physically in a brick wall? ‘Dead Drops’ is a fascinating new project developed by Berlin-based media artist Aram Bartholl where USB storage drives are left in various neighborhoods of New York City. Anyone can walk up to them and upload and download whatever they feel.
‘Dead Drops’ is an anonymous, offline, peer to peer file-sharing network in public space. USB flash drives are embedded into walls, buildings and curbs accessable to anybody in public space. Everyone is invited to drop or find files on a dead drop. Plug your laptop to a wall, house or pole to share your favorite files and data. Each dead drop is installed empty except a readme.txt file explaining the project.
Check out deaddrops.com and Aram Bartholl’s website for more info. Links via likecool.
